The NY Observer reports that Simon & Schuster cut three employees last week: two Pocket Books editors and a Simon Spotlight Entertainment editorial assistant.
The Pocket Books layoffs included editorial director Maggie Crawford and editor Margaret Clark. Clark had worked specifically with Star Trek books, growing a fanbase in the obsessive, dedicated Star Trek universe. One fan worried about the publisher’s loss on a message board: “She’s done a good job for a long time … what happens when you hire a rookie who doesn’t even know what Star Trek is?”
Last December, Simon & Schuster cut 35 positions. As GalleyCat reported, the publisher’s CEO Carolyn Reidy called the restructuring “an unavoidable acknowledgment of the current bookselling marketplace and what may very well be a prolonged period of economic instability.”